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[SCA-JML] Re: Adventurous ancestors!

Ii Dono! Greetings from Solveig! To quote from your favorite authority: Rice cultivation too hold from the third century BCE (p. 17) This agrees exactly with

Message 1 of 56
, Dec 2, 2002

Ii Dono!

Greetings from Solveig! To quote from your favorite authority:

Rice cultivation too hold from the third century BCE (p. 17)

This agrees exactly with one of the sources I quoted if you understand
this date to refer to early introduction and not large scale pady farming.

Ever since Japan was first administered as a nation in the
fifth century, ways to augment the rice harvest have been
the keystone of agriculture policy. (p. 18)

According to Nihonshi Kenkyuu (1998) the earliest known example of
writing in Japan dates to a sword inscription produced ca 471 CE.
I really think that Ishige is reaching for it when making claims
about Japanese national policy in the fifth century. It is not
at all clear that Japan had central government until about the
time of the Taika Reform. This text goes on to hold with historical
orthodoxy and states that proto-Japan enjoyed tribal governance
from the end of the fifth through the sixth centuries. Surviving
histories only date from about 711 CE. Beasley credits Emperor
Ojin with heading the first national government around 400 CE.
However, it is unlikely that this government extended much beyond
Kyuushuu.

The reference to state Shinto ore interesting as Victorian writings
about Japan describe state Shinto as a newly invented institution.
Most modern histories describe early japan as having priest/kings
who celebrated their tribal deity. In proto-Shamanism, the celebrant
becomes the god during the reitual. In later Shamanism, totemic
objects are inhabited by the diety during the ritual. (ref. The Gods
Come Dancing)

>The point being made was that the lack of iron is a reasonable
>hypothesis why widespread wet-field rice agriculture got started so
>late in Japan.

Iron is a better argument for certain types of ancient and medieval
wheat farming which involve heavy ploughs. Traditional paddy farming
involves using a madock (sp) to prepare the field.

>Only when iron smelting was introduced from the continent did such
>construction practices become cost-effective enough to be attractive
>as a means of subsistence.

What is the causative role of iron tools in preparing rice paddies?
They were already cutting down trees without iron and the longer
rivers were undoubtedly flooding in the Spring.

>As for pony soldiers...what do you mean? The Wei Chronicle, written
>in late Yayoi, mentions that "the Wa people have neither cattle nor
>horses", and this was well after we know paddy-field farming took
>hold.

Could you share a source on that one? I am not disputing small scale
paddy farming. That can be easily accomplished by converting swamps.
As for the Wei Chih. Beasley in "The Japanese Experience" notes that
the chronicle records that the residents of Kyuushuu were cultivating
grain and that some of the grain was rice. Beasley also holds that
early paddy rice culture was opportunistic. (p. 8) Beasly goes on
to say that rice culture reached the Kantou region by the third
century CE. Further, the kofun begin to appear at about this time.

Metal working in Japan is an interesting problem as Beasley notes that
copper was not mined in Japan until the 8th century. So pretty much
all of the bronze and very likely a good deal of the iron must have
been imported. Remember that Japan's iron deposits are particularly
poor and that the Japanese developed techniques for smelting iron-
bearing sand. Japan does have gold and silver deposits. So the Japanese
may have been buying much of their iron.

>"Nevertheless, the overwhelming importance of rice in the Yayoi
>period, as well as throughout Japanese history, is demonstrated by
>the predominantly high percentage of rice among all cereals recovered
>from Yayoi sites, and by the fact that rice was the most important
>food even in mountainous villages of the Historical period which are
>not located in environments ideally suited for rice cultivation."

Beasley points out that rice cultivation defines Yayoi sites. So the
relationship is a bit of a tautology. Also, the historical period is
well after the time frame that we have been contesting.

>So why did almost everyone see a need to start farming rice at once
>(even with the aforementioned new and efficient iron tools)? Was it
>immigration, or interbreeding, or, as I've heard it theorized once
>somewhere, a "cargo cult" sort of thing? Interesting question.

I'm suggesting the introduction of a continental immigrant group
which brought rice farming with it as a cultural norm. Otherwise,
it can be difficult to explain why it took rice 400 years to travel
from the coast of Kyuushuu to the Kantou plain. This group may well
have brought "fish paste" with it as well. However, there is much
less evidence for this "fish paste" than there is for rice.
--

Ii-dono, I occasionally get the early messages out of order as well; however, I can t imagine that there is a problem with Yahoo. Else, how did the others

Message 56 of 56
, Dec 19, 2002

Ii-dono,

I occasionally get the early messages out of order as well; however,
I can't imagine that there is a problem with Yahoo. Else, how did the
others receive the message to reply to? I assume that either A) the
messages are slow enough to deliver to some mail servers that others
reply back to the original and that mail goes through faster than the
original, or B) the time stamp for several of the users are not
configured correctly, and the e-mail program sorts by date. Thus, the
original will flag at the right time, but the reply is incorrectly set
as before the original, or the original is incorrectly set to a future
time, thus letting replies sort before it.
Let me know if anyone else has any more insight on this.